knowing your opponent, a 5/5 PLO hand
 

5/5 PLO. I have about 700 in my stack when the following hand comes up. 3 limpers to me and I limp on the button with AKxx (I simply don't remember what the other two cards were or the suits, since they didn't matter in the hand). Blinds check and we take the flop 6-handed with 30 in the pot.

Flop comes 883r. Checked around. Turn is a king putting a two-flush on the board. Checked to me and I bet 30. My thinking is that this will work close to half the time, and I suspect my hand might even be best given that everyone else has checked twice. Anyway, this is not the interesting decision. Folded to the player on my immediate right who calls. Now here's the interesting part.

River comes an offsuit jack making the board KJ883 with no flush possible, and my opponent leads out 60 (2/3 of the pot). What do I do? This is of course a matter of knowing your opponent, and I've played with this particular guy a number of times. Being from Europe, he is a fairly good big bet player and a terrible limit player. He is quite aggressive, a reasonably good hand-reader, too loose pre-flop. He bluffs frequently (although he's rarely caught... I just know because he shows some of his bluffs), he makes good value bets, and he'll commit all his chips with hands a hair too weak. I'm not sure what he thinks of me, but so far he's never seen me show down a PLO hand that was not the nuts, although he has seen me make big moves with weak hands in Hold'em. So, what do you think?

Re: knowing your opponent, a 5/5 PLO hand
 

I think you could have folded preflop and saved the stress of a decision.

Re: knowing your opponent, a 5/5 PLO hand
 

hey, for all you know those sidecards were double-suited queens.

that said, i generally give credit for a hand to people who suddenly make a big bet on the river for having a hand and playing it in an unorthodox fashion to induce a call. this is a little harder to detect than a standard slowplay, especially in omaha. it just seems like every time i see someone try to play bluff-catcher in this situation, the guy shows down a full house.

Re: knowing your opponent, a 5/5 PLO hand
 

My pessimistic inner-voice would say that either someone has
hit with J8xx or is trapping with K8xx in the hope that you
make a flush on the river. I know very little about PLO at
anything other than tiny limits but I would even be wary of
88xx [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Results/Thoughts
 

I certainly wasn't consider raising, so if I call I only need to be right 2 times in 7. The thing is, I know he's a sophisticated player, and I think he's using the following line of reasoning. Checked to me on a nothing board, he thinks I'll bet pot last to act with any 8 or any house. When it's checked to me again on a nothing turn he thinks it's an obvious spot for me to pick up the pot, and he has to think that his call looks suspicious to me. The river blanks off and he now leads out 60, which I think he thinks I'll see as a slowplayed monster afraid I'll check behind. For all I know at that point, he called the turn with nothing intending to bet the river 100% of the time. And the thing is, there are no straights or flushes possible, and I have TPTK, so the only things that beat me are an 8 and a house (and KJ I guess). Just as he can't give me a big hand, I'd be shocked if he checked twice with a hand given how aggressive he is. He bets enough random stuff that there's no deception necessary when he actually has something. And again, I only need to win 2 times in 7, so I call.

He turns over T9xx with two diamonds for a flush draw on the turn and just a straight draw on the river, and I beat his ten high with my pair of kings. I'm quite plased with this call, mainly because I think I got to one level of thinking higher than him. Then again, I could very well be losing that call 90% of the time, but I do think this is an instructive hand for different levels of thinking in big bet poker.